Will Chickenhawk Joe use Fort Hood to go after Muslim troops?
Joe Lieberman spent the weekend mired in idle speculation (when he wasn’t threatening to kill healthcare reform by not allowing his Senate colleagues to vote).
Another "Joe" -- Joseph McCarthy, launched the "Army-McCarthy hearings" in 1954.
Sen. Joe Lieberman, an independent from Connecticut who heads the Senate’s Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee, said initial evidence suggested that the alleged shooter, Army Major Nidal Hasan, was a “self-radicalized, home-grown terrorist” who had turned to Islamic extremism while under personal stress
… Mr. Lieberman, appearing on “Fox News Sunday,” cautioned that it remained too early to draw any definitive conclusions. He said his comments were based on “reports that we are receiving” about Mr. Hasan’s actions and comments.
… Mr. Lieberman said that if news reports were true that Mr. Hasan had turned to Islamic extremism, “the murder of these 13 people was a terrorist act and, in fact, it was the most-destructive terrorist act to be committed on American soil since 9/11.”
“We don’t know enough to say now, but there are very, very strong warning signs here that Dr. Hasan had become an Islamist extremist and, therefore, that this was a terrorist act,” Mr. Lieberman added.
So … the teevee news told Joe that terrorists may be infiltrating our military, though he can’t say so for sure, but that doesn’t stop him from invoking 9/11 … so now he’s going to have hearings on it? What is Joe going to do? Hold up lists containing the names of every Muslim currently serving in the United States military, and demand that they appear before him and answer as to whether they are now, or have ever been, an Islamic extremist? And … this guy is still chairman of the Homeland Security committee … why, again? Mr. Lieberman may be about to walk down a familiar road for self-important Senators named “Joe,” to whom too much power has been given:
By 1953, Republican Senator Joseph McCarthy had become one of America’s best-known politicians through his campaigns to uncover subversives in government operations. His attacks on the U.S. Army in the fall of 1953 led to the first televised hearings in U.S. history, the Army-McCarthy hearings of 1954. The American public watched McCarthy live in action, and they didn’t much care for what they saw. Popular approval for McCarthy eroded during the hearings and his eventual fall from power became just a matter of time.
In the fall of 1953, McCarthy conducted an investigation of the Army Signal Corps. His announced intent was to locate an alleged espionage ring, but he turned up nothing. However, McCarthy’s treatment of General Ralph W. Zwicker during that investigation angered many. McCarthy insulted Zwicker’s intelligence and commented that he was not fit to wear his uniform.
And no, at long last, Joe — who received multiple draft deferments so he wouldn’t have to fight in Vietnam, like his political doppleganger, Dick Cheney, and just about every other member of the neocon cabal, but who supports sending other people’s sons to die overseas, and who now apparently plans to investigate those wearing the uniform for their religion (rather than , say, letting the Army do its job, and looking into whether there are adequate mental health screenings to keep highly stressed and possibly dangerous individuals away from fellow troops…) has no decency. Read more
Is Rifqa Bary the right’s Elian Gonzales?
The latest Florida psychodrama involves 17-year-old Rifqa Bary, and the state's suddenly right wing governor, Charlie Crist
This is one of those stories that gets lost in the whirlwind of 24-hour news about healthcare hysteria, town hall tom-foolery, tea party cranks and intemperate House members acting up during a joint session of Congress (unless you watch Fox “News.” There, you’ve probably seen it every day…) CNN managed to slip it in Friday, for a few minutes during dayside programming. And what a strange tale it is. The News Junkie sums it up nicely:
A 16-year-old girl runs away from home. She hops a bus from Ohio to Florida and shacks up with a few friends she met on Facebook. Her parents plead for her return and the state of Florida gets involved. If Rifqa Bary was just another runaway, the story would end here. She would have been sent back to Ohio to live with her family and authorities in her home state could hash out any further issues. There’s just one problem: Rifqa’s parents are Muslims.
When I cracked the mic to kick off The News Junkie Radio Show last Saturday, I had no clue the reaction to this story would be so one-sided. Nearly every caller felt the need to inform me of the ‘traditional’ Islamic punishment for Apostasy. You see, Rifqa Bary renounced her faith. And those ‘friends’ she met on Facebook were actually Blake and Beverly Lorenz of the Global Revolution Church in Orlando. She laid low with them for nearly three weeks before a well orchestrated presser where she claimed her parents would kill her if she was forced to return home. She directed any doubting Thomas within earshot to ‘ask Pastor Lorenz’ and insisted it was all ‘in the Koran.’ Read more
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